Coming out of about four months of retreat, I find myself uncertain of what to share here. In this time of retreat, and even before, I’ve fallen away from journaling, finding that conditions move so quickly and, often, but not always, are leaving less residue that needs processing internally or sharing externally. I’ll link a couple of reflections on particular retreat experiences at the end of this blog for those interested in more specifics and just share what arises in general here.
The ups and downs of life are present even when in retreat and meeting them with an open hearted, “Yes, this too,” has made this time more of an exploration than a tribulation. I often remind myself that how I hold it matters, where “it” is whatever is present in life or in my mind, body, heart, breath, being.
The default setting on how I hold things shifted a lot during retreat. Granted, much of that time was a massively and beautifully supported time for seclusion and silence, so not the hardest of situations. Yet, even in such a setting, it is not hard to find external and internal things to be concerned about and grab onto with wanting, or push away with not wanting, or flounder through fear and doubt.
I met a lot of those fear points with the question, “Safe enough?” and discovered that a short deep receptive pause after that question to really listen would often bring me into enough balance and spaciousness that I didn’t need to take any action at all, Not confront, Not worry, Not plan, Not process, Just be with the situation as it was.
Trying for continuity of mindfulness and attention for my meditation practice gave me a lot of opportunity to begin again and I found adding cheerfulness to the kindness I already tend to employ made it a happy experience to start the meditation or mindfulness again and again and again. Practice became celebratory at times. It wasn’t always that way. And the contrast helped me see how cheer was a much better partner for directing the mind than a stern or discouraging disposition.
These months of retreat were like a full system reset. I am deeply grateful to Common Ground Meditation Center, Canmore Theravada Buddhist Monastery, Dhamma Dena, Sayalay Dipankara, and Beth Upton, as well as, all the people who made this season of retreats possible financially and through other acts of care. It would not have been possible without all of you.
Now, after a few days at Tilorien in Belgium and much of the way through the jet lag of my first ever trip to Europe, I have reflected on the benefits of the retreat. The greatest is seeing and shifting away from some unhealthy habits of mind and beginning again each time I fall away from the happier way of practice I see is possible.
There are also some very supportive conditions for practice at Tilorien created by Bhikkhunī Vimala and the Samita supporters. Perhaps more on that in a future post.
